Paul Schneider played Mark Brendanawicz on the first two seasons of Parks and Recreation. It was not a particularly memorable character, which is why no one ever thinks about Mark Brendanawicz unless we spot Paul Schneider in some obscure indie flick or on his stint in The Newsroom and think, “Where have I seen that guy before? Uh .. uh … Oh yeah! He was on Parks and Recreation!” To be fair, it wasn’t really Paul Schneider’s fault. The character wasn’t that well written, the show was still in flux, and when Adam Scott and Rob Lowe came along, Mark Brendanawicz instantly became an afterthought.

But you know what? Real-life Paul Schneider is an interesting dude, and by that, I mean: He does not give a sh*t.

If you’re not familiar with Screencrush’s Mike Ryan — formerly of HuffPo — he has some weird interviewing mojo that seems to disarm his interviewees, and as a result, he often gets weirdly candid answers. I’m sure Mike Ryan has f**ked up a lot of publicists’ days. (A couple of years ago, Mike Ryan basically elicited an existential crisis out of Chris Evans, and it was amazing). For some reason, when celebrities are around Ryan, they just say whatever the f**k they feel like saying, and in the case of Paul Schneider, what he felt like saying was, “I basically don’t give a sh*t about acting. It’s stupid and I hate it and I want to quit.”

That’s a lot different than, “I embodied the spirit of the character.”

I mean, look, I have a problem being judgmental and I shouldn’t. Things that are true for me are not necessarily true for other people. If people want to be hippie-dippy about how they approach acting, then that’s great. But I didn’t study acting. I studied editing at film school and I’ve never taken any acting classes and probably have suffered because of it.

You’ve had a good run.

Oh, without a doubt. And that’s not to say I don’t walk around wondering if I might get struck by lightning at any moment … but who wants to hear anyone wax on about how f*cking– you know, that’s just a c*ck-swinging session.

Excellent. We’re off to a good start. Paul Schneider is basically sh*tting on actors who ramble on about their process like it’s some fine art form. I like Paul Schneider. I doubt that Paul Schneider gives a sh*t what I think, though.

Can you get too far away where you just wind up doing something else with your life?

Oh, are you kidding me, I f*cking think about it every day. Absolutely. I’m dying to do something else.

Does this mean I won’t see you in any more movies? I saw your name in this and was excited to see it.

I mean, it is an honor to be filmed tripping and falling and looking like a refrigerator next to beautiful women in this movie.

There’s a lot of sex in this movie.

Yeah, yeah, I know. It’s interesting. Yeah, it’s nerve-racking. But the real answer to what we’re talking about right now is that I want to be discerning and I don’t want to be in a bunch of sh*t. And, you know what? No one does. No one does. I don’t say that like, “I’m the only one!”

Right.

If I’m always working on my career or pursuing jobs in acting, what am I going to act about? Don’t I need to chew on other stuff to sh*t out something good? I just need different stimulus.

OK! Now Schneider is having his own existential crisis about his job. He’s crossed the line from self-deprecation to, “What I do is dumb.” It sounds like he’s sick of acting. In the full interview, he goes on at more length about this, and about how it’s all bullsh*t networking.

But let’s get to the part about Parks and Recreation. There had been some suggestion that Schneider might return to Parks and Rec for a guest gig on down the line, but Schneider basically said he has zero interest in doing that, and also talked about why he left the show in the first place.

That experience was very strange for me. You know, I signed up for a specific character that was changed in mid-season. And it became a character with a lot less to do. And, all of a sudden, I was kind of confused and kind of having a lot less to do.

I’m not sure the show knew what it wanted to be when it first started.

And what show does? Those guys are working on something that I have no idea how to captain that ship. And I was very happy for the experience to be involved and those guys really figured out what it is they’re doing. I mean, decidedly — they have f*cking the First Lady in the show. Now, the difference for me is, I don’t have cable TV. I watch ‘America’s Funniest Home Videos’ and I watch ‘Frontline.’

Well, at least he’s honest. And it’s true: More than anything, Schneider was a casualty of the writing process. The show just didn’t know what to do with him.

Anyway, you should check out the entire interview because it’s wonderfully candid, and he ends up talking at length about his unironic love of America’s Funniest Home Videos, and how he hates sitcoms.

I agree with Dustin — the writers either didn’t know what to do with him or forgot about him (or both; easy to do the latter with that ensemble). I caught a few of season 1&2 eps of Parks and Rec recently, and he was actually pretty good when he had something to do. In further fairness to him — the first season and a half of Parks and Rec was a mess in general

Were Adam Scott and Rob Lowe an upgrade? Absolutely. But I have no hate toward Mark Brendanawicz.

I agree, I thought he was funny. I mean, he was basically like an alpha build of Ben Wyatt. Certainly not the funniest character on the show, but hell, if I could trade Mark returning for Tom leaving, I would do so in one instant.

@Duchess that might still be one of my favorite episodes of the show. The show always portrays Ron as some superhuman figure, because well, it’s Ron fucking Swanson, but it was funny to see him taken down a peg. Sure the show eventually evolved to the point where he just wasn’t necessary anymore, but I never got all the hate for his character.

@dissident With Chris and Ann gone, and all these marriages and babies and trips to Europe, Parks already isn’t Parks. Tom was great in the early years but he’s become insufferable over the last couple seasons.

@JJ Jr. – man I really disagree. In spirit it’s still very much Parks, and I think tom’s arc over the course of the series and especially the last two seasons is one of the more interesting elements of the show

@dissident Well I envy you enjoying him. He’s had some good moments these last couple years, especially involving the Sapersteins, but more often than not he just pisses me off, and I don’t like seeing his swaggy, snotty attitude just being rewarded over and over. If I could’ve contributed to the writing, I would’ve had him tone that shit down after he failed so massively with Entertainment 720, but instead he went even further with it. I loved him when he was all low-key in the early seasons — he still had that swaggy part of his personality, but it wasn’t always on like it is now. It’s too much.

Anyway, you know I still love the show, but when the show first figured itself out, it was about a bunch of people whose personal lives were kind of all disasters. Now every single one of them except Tom is in a very healthy relationship that seems destined to last (although I guess I shouldn’t bet on Keegan Michael Key sticking around). That, along with the changes to Leslie’s relationship with her job and with Pawnee, just makes it feel like a very different show to me.

They haven’t maximized Aziz lately but he is still a solid character on the show. Parks has grown and isn’t any less of a show because people have gotten married, had babies, or moved away. Community minus Troy? Yeah, that did suffer at times.

The problem with Community minus Troy is that it makes you realize how annoying Abed can be without a partner to work off of. When (If) Community comes back, I hope they focus a few more episodes on the Abed-Annie pairing.

@Bizarro Stormy: I didn’t say it was less of a show. I said it’s a different show. And Tom is no Troy. Well, maybe season 1’s Troy.
@dissident: Yeah, I voted on American Idol once and the pressure nearly gave me a heart attack. Never again.

How about the final scene of the last episode is his walking back into his old office to start his job trying to revert the local government agencies back into inefficient poisoned workplaces, essentially negating everything Leslie has achieved in her career?

That’s how it works in the real world, people. Municipal government employee for 15 years speaking here.

So the show runners for P&R are famous for incorporating the cast’s real life personalities and suggestions into the show, and this guy think acting is stupid and trying at it is stupid, and yet it’s the writer’s fault he didn’t have much to do? Most actors would have killed to have the input those people get…he blew the opportunity.